The iterative HTC One M9 remains a physical jewel and a strong Android smartphone, but fails to take the next step.

Smartphone upgrades are typically biennial events, their significance only enhanced by how personal and essential the devices have become. When upgrading, it's not unreasonable to expect something that's better in ways that go beyond just specs. Therein lies the problem with the HTC One M9 ($649.92 or $27.08/month for 24 months). It feels only partially new, but wholly familiar, even stretching back two years to the original M7. And it's not a familiarity that breeds comfort and confidence, but rather a type of upgrade ennui. For all of its beauty and speed, there's no single reason to choose the M9 over its predecessor, let alone its competitors. It's still the most gorgeous Android option around, but even the design advantage is beginning to wane. As the competition marches forward, HTC obstinately iterates. The M9 is an exceptional phone, but it's just not the best option out there.

Design, Features, and Network PerformanceNo one doubts HTC's design prowess at this point. The basic formula is the same, but the M9 feels more precise and meticulously thought out than ever. I love its subtle, two-tone look, and the brushed finish is every bit as luxurious as last year's model, if not more so. Small details like sharper, more squared-off edges and a welcome tackiness to the finish help the M9 feel far more secure in the hand. The Power button is finally on the side, rather than the top, and properly textured to differentiate it from the neighboring Volume buttons. Don't mistake iteration with an absence of improvements. This is still the best-looking, best-handling Android smartphone available.

The 5-inch, 1080p LCD remains visibly unchanged from last year. It's not as excessively sharp as Quad HD displays, but it's still top-notch. In side-by-side tests, though, it lags behind the Apple iPhone 6 display in terms of brightness and color reproduction. Whites look a bit cool on the M9 compared with the iPhone 6's clean, stark color. It also can't match the Galaxy S6 in terms of brightness, color richness, and contrast. Really, though, you'll never notice these deficiencies unless you're constantly comparing displays.

Editors' Note: The slideshow below is of the unlocked One M9, which is physically identical to the T-Mobile model.

Flanking the top and bottom of the display, the signature front-facing speakers appear unchanged, but actually sound a touch louder compared with the speakers on the One M8. The drawback here is mild distortion, which isn't an issue on the M8. Since I don't think anyone really expects clean and accurate audio from their phones, I'll take a little boosted volume. The bottom-mounted headphone jack has some serious power behind it, driving my usual pair of headphones noticeably louder than the maximum volume I'm used to. The standard "BoomSound" sculpting now has multiple profiles courtesy of Dolby, and you can actually hear a difference between Theater and Music modes whether you're using the built-in speakers or headphones.

On T-Mobile, the M9 supports GSM (850/900/1800/1900MHz), UMTS (850/1700/1900/2100MHz), and LTE (Bands 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 12, 13, 17, 29, 30) network connectivity. HTC doesn't have as strong of a track record as Samsung when it comes to call quality, but the M9 performed well in my tests. Earpiece volume is strong, and voices coming through the other end of the line sounded full and easy to understand. Transmissions through the mic weren't the clearest I've experienced, but the M9 did a good job of preserving natural voice tones. Noise cancellation was simply average in my tests; on an especially loud street corner, I could still hear a good deal of background noise as cars whizzed by, and my voice sounded wobbly on a voicemail test. For more tame environments, the M9 was able to effectively dampen outside interference. The M9 supports T-Mobile's Wi-Fi calling feature, which worked without issue in my tests, as well as HD Voice calls when available.

I tested network speeds against a T-Mobile Samsung Galaxy Note Edge, which was one of the better performers when we reviewed it last year. The results were very positive for the M9, showing both stronger LTE reception and speeds. From a spot with good LTE reception, the M9 averaged 13.8Mbps down and 16.42Mbps up, compared with the Note Edge's 11.5Mbps down and 8.33Mbps up. Moving to an area with poor service, the Note Edge dropped down to HSPA+, while the M9 was able to cling to the LTE signal. From there, the M9 averaged 8.73Mbps down to the Note Edge's 3.94Mbps. Curiously, the M9's uplink speeds dropped to 0.62Mbps versus the Edge's 5.03Mbps.

On Wi-Fi, the story isn't quite as positive for the M9, which supports dual-band 802.11b/g/n/ac networks. The Note Edge is still the Wi-Fi king thanks to its MIMO antennas, which enabled speeds that averaged a blazing-fast 111.18Mbps down and 76.99Mbps up. Connected to the same speedy FiOS 5GHz Wi-Fi network, the M9 only managed 19.24Mbps down and 19.19Mbps up. While it's not going to displace the Note Edge, it did fare better than an Apple iPhone 6, which averaged 14.14Mbps down and 15.25Mbps up on the same test.

Rounding out the connectivity features are Bluetooth 4.1, NFC, and GPS, all of which worked fine. The M9 also supports MHL, and I was able to mirror the phone's display onto Sony and JVC HDTVs using an appropriate adapter (not included).

Performance and Android Qualcomm dominated last year's flagship smartphone lineup, leading to very equitable and predictable scores all around. This year, HTC's betting on Qualcomm's latest 1.5GHz Snapdragon 810 processor, while Samsung opts for a homegrown Exynos chip. We already tested the 810 on the LG G Flex 2 and the international version of the HTC One M9, but both were running pre-production software, so this is the first official look at what U.S. customers should expect from the 810.

As predicted, synthetic benchmarks numbers are impressive across the board, earning the M9 top marks on nearly every test. CPU-intensive tests showed the greatest leap over Snapdragon 805-powered devices like the Note 4, while GPU-intensive results weren't as dramatically different. For instance, on the off-screen GFXBench Manhattan test, the M9 managed 23fps to the Note 4's 18.7fps.

Heat is a bit of an issue here, but it's not debilitating—the M9 got pretty hot after a round of benchmarking, but it was only mildly uncomfortable to hold to my face at peak heat. Thankfully, I didn't see any erratic behavior as a result of the heat, and the M9 never dialed back the screen brightness or issued any warnings during my tests. It also never approached peak heat during normal use, only getting its hottest after running back-to-back graphically intensive tasks for about 30 minutes. The phone also cooled down to acceptable levels after a few minutes of rest.

In a battery rundown test, where we streamed a YouTube video over LTE with screen brightness set to max, the 2,840mAh cell was good for 5 hours, 3 minutes of continuous streaming. That's better than the iPhone 6's 4 hours, 33 minutes, but less than even last year's Galaxy S5, which lasted 7 hours in the same test.

Custom launchers aren't the miasma they once were in the Android world. HTC's Sense 7, running atop Android 5.0.2, is tasteful and speedy, with some useful tricks that you won't find in stock Android. The biggest strengths here are the seamless visual customization and skinning options built into the software. HTC streamlines the process for those that don't want to muck around with third-party launchers and theme stores. The M9 comes with a suite of preloaded themes and a curated theme store that changes everything from icons to system sounds, completely modifying the look of your phone with a single tap. Choices run the gamut from gorgeous to gauche, but most are at least well-executed. There also seems to be a thriving community already, as new themes popped up with surprising frequency during my test period, which was before the phone was even released.

BlinkFeed returns, offering curated news and social media updates on a Flipboard-like canvas that sits to the left of the main home screen. The big addition this year is a new Sense Home widget, which is the latest in the recent wave of contextually aware home screen offerings. Sense Home is designed to learn your habits, preferences, and most-frequented locales to serve up relevant apps that change based on what it thinks you need or want. There are three location-based profiles for Home, Work, and Out, which continually change based on your behavior. I didn't find them all that accurate or useful, but the way I use my phone at work isn't all that dissimilar from how I use it at home. Still, I found the suggestions for apps to download to be way off-base—I have no interest in a streaming mixtape app called DatPiff, contrary to what HTC and my co-workers might believe. And Candy Crush Soda for work? Well, I guess I can clear a few levels now, if you insist. Perhaps Sense Home gets more prescient over time, but I'm not convinced at this point.

Of the 32GB of internal storage, only about 21GB was available out of the box. There isn't a ton of inane bloatware, thankfully, but apps like T-Mobile TV and Lookout Security cannot be uninstalled. Likewise, HTC apps like Zoe or Cloudex (cloud storage) can only be disabled, instead of removed. But HTC should be lauded for keeping the microSD card slot when competitors like Samsung have had to nix expandable storage for the sake of design.

Camera and ConclusionsThe M8's Achilles heel was camera performance. The 4-megapixel, or "Ultrapixel," sensor just didn't make the cut against phones like the iPhone 5s or the Galaxy S5. HTC moved that sensor to the front, which makes for some really nice selfies, especially in low-light scenarios.

With final firmware in place, results from the 20-megapixel main camera are dramatically better than the mess produced by the international model we tested initially, but still far from class-leading. Contrast is deeper, colors are richer, and details are sharper with the T-Mobile model. The unpleasant, splotchy artifacts we saw on the international unit are also measurably reduced.

Unfortunately, the M9 didn't come close to the clarity and color depth achieved by the Samsung Galaxy Note 4 or the Galaxy S6 in side-by-side tests. Focus times also couldn't touch the nearly instantaneous iPhone 6. In good outdoor lighting, images had better dynamic range than the international model, but again appeared less punchy and often softer than results from the GS6 and iPhone 6. Camera performance isn't going to necessarily hold the M9 back like last year, but if you want superlative imaging prowess, you'll have to look elsewhere.

Video resolution tops out at 4K and framerates hold steady at 28fps, but footage is 4K in name only. Under standard indoor lighting, details become a waxy, smeared mess, with overwhelming graininess throughout the scene. Exposure jumps up and down erratically when presented with multiple light sources, while you can see a rolling shutter effect during quick pans. Full HD (1080p) footage fares better, though it's still nothing to write home about. Footage shot outdoors looks appropriately crisp and lifelike, but I'd much rather take the Note 4 or iPhone 6 for my video and photo needs.

In many ways, the One M9 is a victim of HTC's early success. The M7 was a fantastic phone that blew people away with its high-end materials and design. Instead of pushing forward, though, HTC played it safe with both the M8 and the M9. Unfortunately for the fading mobile stalwart, the third time is not the charm. There are some notable upgrades, deficiencies have been addressed, and the phone generally feels snappier and better thought-out, but it simply fails to drum up the excitement befitting a shiny new flagship.

Make no mistake: This is still a very good phone, and the rating above reflects that. It's just not an exciting upgrade, particularly if you're coming from the M7 or the M8. The One M9 will make a fine phone for the fashion-conscious, but that's no longer enough to carry it past the fierce competition.

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About the Author

Before joining the consumer electronics team at PCMag, Eugene worked at local news station NY1 doing everything from camera work to writing scripts. He grew up in Montclair, New Jersey and graduated from the University of Virginia in 2010. Outside of work Eugene enjoys TV, loud music, and making generally healthy and responsible life choices.

HTC One M9 (T-Mobile)

HTC One M9 (T-Mobile)

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